


Drifting

by flibbertygigget



Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Angst, Gen, Getting Older, Growing Up, Inspired by A Slight Trick of the Mind, Moving On, No Resolution, loss of friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-31
Updated: 2015-01-31
Packaged: 2018-03-09 18:51:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3260651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flibbertygigget/pseuds/flibbertygigget
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Whatever tether had connected the two of us had been broken, and now I was left alone, drifting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drifting

**Author's Note:**

> So, I just finished A Slight Trick of the Mind, the Holmes book that the new Ian McKellen movie is supposedly going to be based off of. And... well, it was really good. Really sad, but really good. So here is some angsty goodness that you don't even need to have read the book tk understand!

The first sign I had that my dearest friend was gradually drifting away from me was when I heard about his latest exploit from the  _Times._ It was not unusual, of course,  for him to have completed a case without me, but this was the first time since... well, since the first weeks of our acquaintance that he had not informed me, not even in a letter, that he had apprehended a dangerous criminal.

My emotions, confused though they were, eventually settled on a sort of anger. It wasn't fair to him, I know, but at that moment I wanted to throttle the man who had been- who  _was_ my dearest friend and companion. How dare he cut me out like this? My duties to my practice, my wife, and my children might make it difficult for me to accompany him as I once did, but surely Holmes knew that I would have been more than happy to have gone with him, especially since, from the paper's account, this criminal had been a famously bloodthirsty killer?

Fuming, I stormed out the door and headed toward Baker Street. As I walked down familiar roads, well-worn with memories, my anger began to subside and be replaced by a deep fear. Holmes, after all, relished any opportunity to flaunt his powers, especially to such an appreciative audience as myself. Perhaps, in his hunt for the killer, Holmes had gotten injured in some way. His was a dangerous line of work, and it certainly wouldn't have been the first time. My pace quickened almost to a run as a thousand terrible possibilities passed through my vision.

At last I arrived at 221 Baker Street. Looking up at the old brick building, I was hit with a terrible sense of nostalgia. The feeling only heightened as I was led up the stairs by the now elderly Mrs. Hudson. So many treasured memories were held inside these walls, and despite my worry I smiled slightly.

"Mr. Holmes!" Mrs. Hudson called through the door. Faintly I heard one of the loud, sighing groans my friend made whilst in a bout with boredom. Giving me an exasperated look, Mrs. Hudson opened the door for me and retreated down to her flat. For a moment I just stood there and stared at my friend, who was flung across the sofa like a prima donna. Then I cleared my throat, and Holmes' eyes snapped open.

"Watson!" said he, grinning broadly at me from his upside-down position over the arm of the sofa. I raked my eyes up and down his body, bit except for having lost some weight he really couldn't afford he seemed healthy. My worries abated, and I forced myself to smile.

"I read of your exploits in the paper," said I. Holmes snorted.

"Exploits, Watson? Really? Can even you be overdramatic as that?"

"As though you are one to talk of dramatics," I said fondly. Holmes chose to ignore my jape.

"Well, it was a pretty little problem nonetheless, Watson. Come, come sit. There is no diubt that the papers have botched it up as usual." I obediently crossed the room and sat in my customary chair. Holmes immediately launched into his tale, but I must admit that, though I murmered and nodded at all the right moments, my mind was not with my friend.

Holmes had not realized it yet, but it was clear to me. The Holmes of old would never have contented himself with simply correcting the newspaper. The me of old would never have heard of a dangerous situation after the fact. And as I sat there, watching Holmes speak with his animation and earnestness none diminished, I was struck with a terrible feeling of sadness.

Whatever tether had connected the two of us had been broken, and now I was left alone, drifting. Under different circumstances I might have bitterly blamed Holmes, but this was not his doing. After all, there he sat, unchanging as the sea, and here I sat, having already moved on in spite of myself. No, this loneliness I felt was on me, but what else was I supposed to have done?

In my stories I had on occasion compared Holmes to a sort of thinking machine, which was patently untrue. Though not as easily moved as I, Holmes could feel as deeply as any man. He was more akin to an insect encased in glass: vibrant, eye-catching, eternal. I was of a more common stock. I had my Amanda and my little ones, William, Mary, and Timothy. I had moved on, grown older, while Holmes was much the same at 45 as he had been at 25. I have no doubt he will stay in his glass until he is 100.

I still wished- oh, how bitterly I wished!- that I could follow him as I once had, but I am no fool. I knew that those insects not preserved in a professor's study were doomed to fly away from their counterparts, doomed to move on and eventually die.

Holmes, smart as he was, seemed not to understand the fundamental differences in our natures. If the population of the world could be seen in the sands of Afghanistan,  than Holmes was a rock, a monolith standing in the middle of the desert, a man unlocking and unchanging as ages swirled around him. I, on the other hand, was just a grain of sand swept up in the wind, flung here and there, gradually shifting farther and farther from the only fixed point in an ever-changing landscape.

When Holmes' story came to an end, I smiled, shook his hand, and left. There was no point in looking back, in fact it would only make our parting more painful, but still I did. Holmes was staring out the winow after me, a hand pressed against the glass as though through sheer willpower he could reach through it and drag me back into that unchanging glass box. I shook my head and turned away, hoping, praying that it was to be the last time. 


End file.
